Having checked as much as possible the results of the Local\nGovernment elections I can find no firm figures at the time of writing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However as far as I can gather from the newspapers – Herald\nand National -the best I can get is that in England the Tories lost 1334 seats\nand Labour between 80 and 90; in Northern Ireland the DUP is under pressure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However I did find out something surprising \u2013 it would seem\nthat there were no elections in Wales \u2013 or London! <\/p>\n\n\n\n
* <\/strong>Never dawned on me that London is a separate country, but hey, whatever the Tories want they get.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whatever the figures are they show a distinct disillusion\nwith the major parties in England .<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mrs May has now lost 48 Cabinet Ministers since the General\nElection in May 2017, only 2 a month; of\ncourse the \u201cStrong and stable\u201d euphemism is merely a blip. Not all of her\ndisastrous appointments have bitten the dust, Chris Grayling, the man who paid\n\u00a330 million of our money to a ferry company with no ships and a few other\ncommitments making up to <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u00a356 million is still in place. Perhaps Mrs May wants to reach\n50, no doubt a record devoutly to be desired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n *<\/strong> As a footnote, I was amused to learn that Boris Johnston had tweeted that he had cast his vote.\u00a0 He hurriedly erased the tweet as he realised there was no voting in London, but the very fact that he lied as he did not say to remember but that he had voted.\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n Comment of an honest politician \u2013 Torywise!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ruth Davidson is of similar mettle; two years ago she said\nthere was no reason for Mrs Theresa May to block a second Independence\nReferendum, now she believes she should.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Currency<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I was at the Conference in Edinburgh\nand while I did not go into the Chamber a lot I did see a bit of the debate on\nthe Growth Commission. The background to\nthis was that in the 2014 Referendum we lost because of the claim by George\nOsborne \u2013 was that his name? \u2013 that we would not be able to use the pound which\nhas since turned out to be a lie. Both\nthe current Governor of the Bank of England and his predecessor said we\ncould. However in the heat of battle NO\nwon the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is premature to talk about a new currency before we are\nindependent, but there is a risk the currency issue may cost us\nindependence. There is no doubt that\nour enemies are slavering at the mouth as they see a chance to weaken us and\nthey will do it relentlessly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Westminster stewardship of the British economy has been\nappalling; Norway discovered the same amount of oil at the same time as we\ndid. They revitalised their economy,\nbuilt housing, roads, bridges and tunnels and also founded a sovereign wealth\nfund which now amounts to over 1 trillion, and rising. The UK squandered\nbillions of oil money on we know not what and created a National Debt of around\nthe same amount. Our debt is still rising and is maybe heading for \u00a32\ntrillion! (The sum is increasing by \u00a35170\nper second) Any idea that the UK is shrewd when it comes to money is\nfallacious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Added to all this are billions in offshore accounts, hidden\nfrom the public gaze which they seem unable – really unwilling – to\ntackle. And in their generous use of public\nmoney they keep increasing the size of the House of Lords where members get\n\u00a3300 per day, tax free, for just signing in, and free first class travel – things\nare tough at the top!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Marches<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It is a boost to morale to see vast numbers marching for Independence\nbut I do not know if they translate into votes, let me rephrase that, there is\nno doubt that every marcher will vote Yes, but that alone will not get\nindependence. In the hard light of day\nwe have to canvass for votes, knock doors, convert voters and make sure they\nvote; this is the job of the SNP. They\nhave the organisation and discipline to get this done, but we need the Yes\nmarchers to add volume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Speaking of Marches I recall one particular one in Dundee, in\nthe Eighties I think; it was a very wet day and the route was agreed by\nPolice. My memory was of chanting\n\u201cMaggie ,Maggie, Maggie, Out, Out, Out\u201d We went through an industrial area in the West End and there were no\nwatchers! Changed days, thank God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When I joined the SNP in 1966, in Peterhead, there was a tide\nrunning for Independence. There were no\nTV images, the SNP had a Bannockburn Rally every year and the SNP Peterhead\nBranch ran a bus to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Just why the tide was rising was unclear, but it was\ndefinitely there. Two incidents spring\nto my mind from that period; in the company I worked for we had a vehicle\nwasher who was deaf and dumb. As he\npassed my car one day he gave a broad grin and a thumbs up to my SNP sticker\nand I wondered \u201cHow does he know?\u201d The\nother incident involved a Shell representative; every month he came in to get\nthe monthly cheque, and quite often he would have to come back. The cheque would be for a substantial amount\nfor we ran 70 long distance lorries and used a lot of diesel. I was the Accountant and the company was\nowned by Transport Development Group and every month we sent the surplus to HQ\nin London. Anyway the representative\nmentioned that he had joined the SNP \u2013 and from that day on he got his cheque\non the dot!<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is not a nostalgic comment but an indication of how\nthings were in Scotland over 50 years ago. The SNP was founded in 1934, 6\nmonths before I was born, and had a mixed reception from Scots; I was fortunate to know Dr Robert McIntyre,\nJimmy Halliday, Arthur Donaldson, Billy Wolfe, Gordon Wilson, Alex Salmond,\nJohn Swinney and now Nicola Sturgeon all leaders of the SNP. I also knew Winnie\nEwing; this is not name-dropping but merely a comment on how much smaller the\nSNP was; I struggle to know who is who\nthese days \ud83d\ude0a<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1967 Winnie Ewing won the Hamilton By-Election, a\nstupendous achievement. On the night she\nwon we had gathered in a house where somebody had a TV set, and we were\necstatic. At around 1 am I phoned my\nwife to tell her that Winnie had won. \nShe rather drily replied \u201cI know, this phone has not stopped\nringing.\u201d At the time we did not have a\nTV, could not afford one – strange to remember. \nThis was not uncommon in Peterhead, and I quite often had to tell\nvisiting representatives in my office that \u201cI am not Brethren \u2013 I just do not\nhave a TV\u201d. No comment was ever made but\nbody language spoke for itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This preamble is all about perceptions; we did not win the 2014 Referendum because\nthe Unionists kept banging on about the pound and frightened the\nelectorate; I read the White Paper, all\n600 odd pages of it, and I did not find anything I disagreed with. The Unionists were fairly confident up until\nthe last couple of weeks when a Poll showed Yes in the lead. This led to the Vow, allegedly by David\nCameron, Nick Clegg, George Osborne and Gordon Brown which appeared on the\nfront page of the Daily Record. This was\nmade up by the Editor of the Record \u2013 (who is now a member of the Yes movement)\nand credited with the result. As Alex\nSalmond put it, if the Poll had been the following week we would have won, but\nthere was enough time for No to recover \u2013 and that is history. Sair, very sair. <\/p>\n\n\n\n George Osborne got on a plane, flew into Edinburgh, stated\n\u201cAn independent Scotland will not be allowed to use the pound\u201d and left\nimmediately without taking any questions from the Press. He actually had no right to make that\nstatement as the Government had handed over control of the Bank of England to\nthe Bank on 6th<\/sup> May 1997, and the Government had no locus in the\naffair!<\/p>\n\n\n\n No country gaining independence has ever had the currency\ndenied. Our nearest neighbour, Ireland, continued\nto use the pound for 6 years after independence, then switched to the Punt, and\neventually took the Euro \u2013 in 2002. There\nis NO obligation to use the Euro. 19 of\nthe EU\u2019s 28 states use the Euro plus 4\nother non member states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I sometimes wonder if the UK\u2019s dislike of the Euro has\nsomething to do with the billions of offshore funds hiding in other countries?\nThere are even funds in Ireland, courtesy of Jacob Rees Mogg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And a postscript, Tory Cabinet Minister David Lidlington has\njust announced that the European Elections will go ahead. Must dig out my SNP\nwindow poster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Having checked as much as possible the results of the Local Government elections I can find no firm figures at the time of writing. However as far as I can gather from the newspapers – Herald and National -the best I can get is that in England the Tories lost 1334 seats and Labour between 80 and 90; in Northern Ireland the DUP is under pressure. However I did find out something surprising \u2013 it would seem that there were no elections in Wales \u2013 or London! * Never dawned on me that London is a separate country, but hey, whatever the Tories want theyRead More →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2487"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2487"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2490,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2487\/revisions\/2490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}